US Should Abandon Global Democratization Efforts: Activists Claim - Free Paper Sample

Introduction

Over the last few years, there have been constant criticism that the United States should consider attempting to spread democracy to a global perspective. Some political leaders have been pushing spreading democracy to other countries, which ally with the United States. However, in most cases, it has always faltered. Activists across the United States have, however, claimed that the idea of fostering global democratization should be abandoned, and the country should consider scaling back its effort and concentrate on achieving democracy within its jurisdictions. Other scholars such as Robert Kaplan have always argued against the implementation of the plan by stating that democratization at a global scale can potentially hinder efforts to embrace peace, economic development, and social stability in other countries (Rhodes & Harutyunyan, 2019). Consequently, other researchers such as Fareed Zakaria have concluded that holding an election across countries lacking liberal values potentially creates illiberal democracy, which finally leads to freedom threats. The paper aims at analyzing the idea of whether the United States should consider extending democracy to a global scale.

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Defining Liberalism and Democracy

Definition of Democracy

Democracy is quite a broad topic of study which most people fail to define correctly. However, democracy refers to a system in which no person is entitled to selecting himself; no person can be able to invest himself with a ruling power ((Rhodes & Harutyunyan, 2019). Therefore, no individual can abrogate to himself unlimited and unconditional power. Concerning political power, democracy can be defined as a governance system where rulers are considered accountable for their actions in public perception through an indirect act of citizens through cooperation and competition with their elected representatives.

Liberalism and Democracy

While democracy can be considered to be a set of legislative procedures entailing completion and participation, on the other hand, liberalism refers to a political philosophy that is built on individual freedom principles. Some definitions suggest that liberalism is built on tolerance and liberty, and its ends are property and life. Therefore, it can be concluded that liberalism call for a guarantee on individual rights. Liberalism entails freedoms such as the right to exchange and own property, religious freedom, freedom from any form of arbitrary authority, right to equal opportunities in employment, education, and healthcare (Rhodes & Harutyunyan, 2019). Liberalism sentiment also involves the right to political representation and participation. From the definition of liberalism, it is clear that only the last set of rights are necessarily assured policies meeting the earlier definition of democracy.

It can be observed that most democracies fall under liberal democracy at a certain level. Some countries tend to adopt a mix of civil liberties with a guarantee of procedural democracy. Therefore the key concept of spreading democracy I the argument on any state currently practicing liberal principles has a high likelihood of potentially being democratic since political accountability, competition, and participation are among the best aspect to guarantee that individual freedom aspect is highly preserved. Therefore, the term democracy and liberal are two highly conjoined aspects.

Why the US Should Promote Democracy to Other Countries

The US should be at the forefront of promoting democracy since there are multiple reasons to do so. According to critiques, spreading democracy is not a bad idea. Promoting democracy would serve numerous benefits to both the US and new democracies. Firstly, promoting democracy abroad would lead to liberty. Liberty is good for the new democracies since the citizens enjoy human rights. It would encourage individual liberty amongst the citizens involving freedom of conscience, freedom of expression, and freedom to have private assets. In democratic politics, respecting the liberty of individuals acts as an inherent attribute. Liberty is a peculiar virtue found when democracy is exercised (Rummel, 2018).

Spreading democracy abroad would focus on the establishment of a democratic political process that depends on electoral competition. The competition relies on the citizen’s freedom of expression alongside the freedom to decide on elective choices. Through this, countries would be accountable to the public. The result of this is that they would not deprive the human rights of citizens. Thus, promoting the spread of democracy globally would likely lead to improved individual liberty.

Secondly, promoting democracy abroad would mean that the new democracies will fail to use violence against their citizens. Through the spread of liberal democracy, the individuals living in liberal states and democracies would less likely suffer from abuse, civil unrest, and violent deaths from the hands of their governments. Several studies approve this argument—the work of R.J. Rummel, concerning liberal democracies between the 1900s to late 1980s, proved that approximately 0.14% of their populations faced violent deaths each year from internal violence (Rummel, 2018). 0.59% and 1.48% were noted in the study as actual figures from authoritarian and totalitarian regimes, respectively (Rummel, 2018). These regimes are the ones that are associated with killing their people.

Unlike the authoritarian and totalitarian regimes, democracies have nearly never been linked with the mass killing of their citizens. However, democracies such as Britain and America have murdered foreign civilians in events of the war. An example is the British and American bombing campaigns against Japan and Germany. The reasons for the virtual absence of civil unrest and violence in democracies is associated with two goals. The first one is that the political systems limit the power held by governments, which reduces the capability of committing a massacre to their people. According to Rummel, absolute power can kill absolutely (Rummel, 2018). The second one is that democratic polities grant permission to get opposed openly, and during power transfer, the process is done peacefully.

Thirdly, promoting democracy abroad can be linked to improved economic performance in the long run (Doorenspleet, 2019). New democracies tend to improve on their economies, and in the long term, they achieve greater prosperity. Hence, promoting democracy would likely ensure that many citizens enjoy improved economic benefits. Even though democracy does not guarantee success, there is a strong correlation between the two. Prosperity is one of the achievable advantages of democracy. Some democracies such as the Philippines and India have flagged over the year economically, until recent years. Most of the prosperous societies on earth are based on democracy. All nations that have achieved the highest economic performance level in several generations have had stable democracies (Doorenspleet, 2019).

Some authoritarian regimes, such as the Soviet Union, manage to make short-run economic records that are impressive. The annual growth of the Soviet Union has surpassed that of the United States in the gross national product (GNP) for several decades. Due to this, Nikita Khrushchev, who is the leading Soviet Premier, threatened to ‘bury’ United States (Doorenspleet, 2019). Also, the double-digit annual GNP has increased over the past few years. However, the lack of democracy in these autocratic countries leads them to rarely keep up with the rate of economic growth for long.

Why the US Should Not Promote Democracy to Other Countries

Even though there is underlying importance for the United States carrying out a democracy expansion plan to a global scale, there are issues which may result once the plan is executed (Habermas, 2015).. Planning to extend democracy to a global scale means taking certain political risks, which may endanger the sovereignty of a given country. The following reasons negate the plans to extend democracy across multiple countries:

There will be an Increase Risk of War as a Result of Democratization. Making efforts on how to promote democracy comes at a risk of war as an immediate transition results for the countries engaged. There is a strong correlation between war and democratization, according to the research carried out by Edward Mansfield (Habermas, 2015). Old leaders are likely to inflict war so that they can be able to remain in power. Cases fo emerging democracies lacking strict democratic rules are likely to compete for support while looking for escape plans through failure in foreign views. Consequently, the action tends to increase cases of both internal and external conflict.

The promotion of elections at a global scale can be either irrelevant or harmful. According to recent criticism, there are little positive effects associated with democratic elections, especially in countries lacking essential social-economic aspects or those lacking liberal societies. Using democratic means may turn to oppression on countries lacking economic development. Democracy is not always related to economic success; hence it may turn out to be the hindering factor.

Conclusion

Depending on recent critiques, the idea of promoting democracy abroad has not presented any convincing reasons for not being pursued. Promoting democracy globally offers a lot of advantages and benefits to the United States and the new democracies. Promoting democracy allows the democratic peace proposition to be robust. Furthermore, there needs more evidence on how democratization increases the threat of war and other conflicts. However, questions such as the policies followed while promoting democracy abroad remain unanswered.

References

Doorenspleet, R. (2019). Democracy and Development. In Rethinking the Value of Democracy (pp. 201-236). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-91656-9_6

Habermas, J. (2015). Democracy in Europe: Why the Development of the EU into a Transnational Democracy Is Necessary and How It Is Possible. European Law Journal, 21(4), 546-557. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/eulj.12128?casa_token=kL5-QzaT7xoAAAAA:Tw6mR4CNszc0GvbXrCsmeEMKvVWLM3Xbtx_8Iu-HR5MKifOwEMcvIiKZuYbFvTIheAe2c9a8d8Kbx1Iu

Rhodes, S., & Harutyunyan, A. (2019). Extending citizenship to emigrants: Democratic contestation and a new global norm. International Political Science Review, 31(4), 470-493. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0192512110374044Rummel, R. J. (2018). Death by Government: Genocide and mass murder since 1900. Routledge.